Ninjutsu Online

My Family

This was torture, I mean what other word was there to call this; maybe there was a word but I’m not too keen on dwelling on that right now. I looked at my father’s haggard face and my mom’s with the crows feet and wrinkles around the edge of her eyes. If they were in front of me it wouldn’t have been this bad, but I had to watch them from a screen, prisoners in the virtual realm, their bodies destroyed and yet they’re still serving a sentence……..it’s been 11 years, 489 left to go before they can be free.

As much as I hated to admit it, they wouldn’t last much longer in there, but I couldn’t get them out either, not without a body to put their mind into. We were all stuck, with no way forward. But that doesn’t mean I would give up. I felt a hand on my shoulders and looked up to see my grandparents giving me a smile, I gave them one back too. I knew how hard they were trying to remain strong, not just for me, but also for my parents, I had to keep a strong front, besides I’m not a kid anymore, heck I’m a full grown man, and the reason why I came to see my parents today was to tell them the good news.

“Christopher you said you had something you wanted to tell us, what is it?”

“Well…….”

“He’s going to be a FATHER THAT’S WHAT! OWWW!”

I had to fight the urge to slap my face as my grandfather let the secret out, and in turn my grandmother had to deliver a slap of her own to the back of my grandfather’s head. My mom could only smile ruefully while me dad burst into tears. I couldn’t help but to feel embarrassed for him, he was the man, but why was he the one getting emotional.

“That’s great news Christopher, it coincides with our own good news too. We’re being transferred into a new game that’s just joined the virtual realm. Somehow the government got the idea that it would be best if prisoners were used as beta testers for the game since they’re more expendable. Nothing much is known about the game at the moment, but it would be launching in just three months. We will be serving out the rest of our sentence within it, and once it launches, I believe you and Diamante and your grandpa Wade and granny Taiye can play it too. It’s not much, but at least we can be together as a family, we can work towards securing our release or shortening our sentence from there.”

This was indeed good news, a news so good that for the first time in a very long time there was a fire that appeared in my heart. A fire that for so long has been nothing more than dying embers, the flames of hope was fully ignited and alive within me once again. In this age there’s nothing money can’t buy, especially freedom. And since more than 97% of humanity’s wealth and funds are concentrated within the virtual realm and the numerous virtual worlds within it, making money from a game was the best possible option for me.

“Then I’ll make sure you’re both free before my child is born, I want your faces to be the first he or she sees when they come into this world. I promise you both, I’ll save our family.”

“I believe you Christopher.” My mom said to me as my grandmother asked.

“What’s the name of this game anyway?” My father perked his head up and wiped his tears as he smiled, his virtual platinum blond hair seemingly glowing.

“Its Ninjutsu Online!”

>>>>>>>>>

THREE MONTHS LATER

Information about Ninjutsu online was practically scarce, there wasn’t even a single trailer released about it, the players only had the reputation of the company that created the game to rely on. About eighty years back, the company had made an online game called elemental warriors online. It was way ahead of it’s time, and it’s servers were active until ten years ago, when they shut down its servers…….. focus was now shifted into Ninjutsu online.

Based on the name of the game alone, it stands to reason that the game was based on ninjas. It was quite nice when you thought about it, ninjas were a product of the old world, it’s hard to imagine that they even exist anymore, but now a game based on them was being created.

Apart from the fact that it was an acknowledgement of Japanese culture, it also served as a way to boost Japan’s economy since the game would be open one week earlier in Japan before being spread to the rest of the world. And that was today, in ten minutes, it was just to my extreme luck that my grandparents had moved to the land of the rising sun when my mom was still just a baby.

“Are you sure about this Honey, you’ve done nothing but try to research this game for the past three months, but you’re still going in blind. You’ve been so stressed lately, maybe it’s better if you take a break for a few days, it’s not a must that you must log in on launch day, there’s no guarantee that you would find father and mother immediately.” Diamante said to me as she followed me into our bedroom.

“I understand you fears my love, but there’s a rumor that this game thrives on achievements and unique instances. Which is to say the early bird gets the worm. I know you’re worried, but I’ll be fine. I’ll go and understand the landscape of the game and I should have enough information for you, grandma Taiye and that perverted old Jiji-Kun to log in within the week.” I said to her as I walked towards gyro sphere pod responsible for transferring my consciousness into the virtual realm.

“You know grandfather doesn’t like it when you call him that.” Dia said to me while trying but failing to stifle the soft laugh coming from her.

I smiled and hugged her, and then I kissed her, putting all of my love and my care into it. And in return she gave me strength, she strengthened my determination and I felt fired up. There was a lot out there for me to achieve, and I know that she’ll be right here waiting for me to finally unite all of our family together.

“He doesn’t have that much of a choice over what name I call him, he’s stuck with it. I’ll be fine, stay safe, take care of the shop, and I love you.”

“I love you too.”

I turned and made my way in the gyro sphere. The gyro sphere worked like a Faraday cage, isolating the fluctuation from brain waves that is sure to be felt whenever someone logs into the virtual realm.

Also as opposed to the novels, it’s almost impossible for a pod or helmet to be capable of intercepting the signals sent from the brain to the limbs. The body still moves, so the gyro sphere, apart from being responsible for connecting the mind with the virtual realm, it also creates a zero gravity chamber to handle the movements of the person that’s diving into the virtual realm. It also helps keep the body fit, so it has quite a lot of uses.

This particular Gyro sphere was the size of two minivans, it had a sleek silver color, and had the initials ‘Zikr DDP 009.7'. It was freaking expensive, but even then it wasn’t even the best in the series, being the seventh version of the generation 9 gyro sphere. Either way it wasn’t too bad, and it would get the job done.

As I stepped into the gyro sphere, the anti gravity field kicked in and my body floated into the air, I was a little bit disoriented for a while before it stabilized and I felt something touching the back of my head. I felt it softly latch onto the back of my neck, and then I took a deep breath waiting for the pain I knew was to come.

*SHICK!!*

A two inch needle went into my brain, and just as it did so, my eyes burst into a shower of colors ranging from all the colors of the rainbow, to even colors not really common. And then I was assaulted by a variety of smells, some were noxious, sweet, rotten, fragrant and sour. Then it was the same with my sense of taste, it was bitter, sweet, sour, bland, and rotten. Then my entire body was exposed to a variety of feelings from solid, rough, smooth, sleek, soft etc.

And then all I could see was black, and then a blue screen appeared in front of me.

User has been scanned and registered as Christopher Dayo Felton, age 23, occupation: Engineer.

{Dive into virtual realm……}

{Dive into specified virtual world……}

{Virtual world available…….welcome to Ninjutsu Online}